My aim is to offer insights into some of the more subtle principles underpinning prints. The commentary is based on thirty-eight years of teaching and the prints and other collectables that I am focusing on are those which I have acquired over the years.
In the galleries of prints (accessed by clicking the links immediately below) I am also adding fresh images offered for sale. If you get lost in the maze of links, simply click the "home" button to return to the blog discussions.

Monday, 6 February 2017

Sebald Beham’s woodcut of Christ bearing the cross

“The Bearing of
the Cross” (Bartsch title), 1521, from the series of eight plates, “The
Passion”

Woodcut on fine
laid paper with the artist’s monogram “HSP” at the upper-right corner.

Size: (sheet)
13.4 x 10.2 cm; (plate) 12.5 x 8.5 cm

State ii (of
ii) Note: the first state shows the date “1521” with the monogram at the upper
right corner, whereas in the second state the date is erased (the reason is
unknown).

Bartsch (1978)
15 (8) 89.II (233); Pauli 823 ii/ii

Condition:
crisp impression from the second state showing very little wear. The sheet
is in excellent condition (near pristine) and attached to a support sheet at the top edge. There is a small margin at the top of the sheet
with larger margins on the other sides.

I am selling
this original early woodcut by one of the leading members of the 16th
century “Kleinmeister” (Little Masters) in Germany for AU$510 (currently US$391.07/EUR363/GBP313.24
at the time of posting this listing) including postage and handling to anywhere
in the world.

If you are
interested in purchasing this historically significant print by one of the
major Renaissance era printmakers, please contact me
(oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make
the payment easy.

This print has been sold

This is a very
early print by Beham executed while he was still under the spell of Dürer’s
influence. In some ways the portrayed scene is the perfect subject for a young journeyman
printmaker, in terms of portraying a subject that is very familiar and socially
acceptable to the public—one of the stages of the cross in Christ’s passion.
Nevertheless, to my eyes the scene represents more than Christ's agony: I see
the gesturing and emotionally charged rebellious boy in the foreground as if his actions were a psychological self-portrait of
the the artist himself.

The reason that
I mention this curious perception is because Beham in his youth was a “bad
boy.” Indeed so exciting was his early years (e.g. being put on trial and
banished for blasphemy, heresy, civil disobedience and later charged with
stealing/plagiarism of unpublished work by Dürer) that Joachim von Sandrart—an
influential arts writer of the time—wrote that Sebald Beham “had a very bad
reputation and led a dissipated life which caused his death” (see Giula Bartrum
1995, “German Renaissance Prints 1490–1550”, p 100). Absolute nonsense of
course, as Bartrum (1995) points out: “ Beham was successful and found a
flourishing market for his prints, which indicates that, despite the troubles
of his youth, he must have tempered his early radical views and settled down in
later life” (ibid.)

From a
technical standpoint, I can see some of Dürer’s influence in this print,
especially with regard to the spatial organisation of the composition. Nevertheless,
by comparison to Dürer’s mature prints, this image is clearly the work of a
developing artist. For instance, in Dürer’s mature prints each line serves a
purpose, whereas here the line work (such as the hatched lines rendering the
stone arches) leans more towards schematic and perfunctory. Beyond such
criticism, however, the portrayed scene expresses a master's vision of space and volume. Note, for example, Beham’s choice to present the scene from a low
vantage point—or to use a phrase that I love, “a worm’s eye view”—and to employ
arches above the figures. Such visual devices project an aura of grandeur to the
scene and hint at the developing genius of Beham's mature prints.

Ultimately, Beham's insight into ways
to subliminally express notions of expansive space, even when the image itself
is small in physical size, earns him, along with his brother,
Barthel, and his colleagues, Georg Pencz, Heinrich Aldegrever and Albrecht
Altdorfer the famous title, “Kleinmeister”, for the ability to capture grand
visions in miniature artworks.